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Posted by: Rodnator Dec 13 2007, 01:51 AM

I would like to ask a question regarding the company line on sharing publicly available guitar pro tabs. Now I am not talking about the Guitar pro software, I know that would be a no no. I have, in my internet travels managed to aquire an extremely eclectic and extremely huge (55,000 songs or variations of songs) collection of Guitar pro tabs in a nice 115 mb zip file. I have yet to search for and not been able to find even the most obscure title since I got it. I have had a habit of sharing this file with all of my guitar buddies here at home in the form of a burned cd. If the moderators could give me an idea if this is ethical or not I might be able to find some web space and create a link availible for download. If this has been previously discussed and found to be not in the interests of those here, I will not bring it up again.

Posted by: The Uncreator Dec 13 2007, 02:14 AM

Seeing as Guitar Pro tabs are widely available and not a form of piracy or anything like that, it should be all right

*EDIT*
Just to make sure, lets wait and see what my fellow mods have to say on this

Posted by: Xranthoius Dec 13 2007, 02:17 AM

Guitar Pro is amazing, I love making things and learning songs with it.

Posted by: JCJXXL Dec 13 2007, 02:58 AM

Yes, excellent program. I have just a bit over 70,000 songs and I agree... it has almost every song I have thrown at it. The other cool thing is if you don't have a GP version of a song you can always import a Powertab version and save as GP.

The program is definitely worth the investment.

Posted by: Smikey2006 Dec 13 2007, 03:51 AM

Yup i use guitarpro for all my song learning needs... i have friends who have downloaded mass files of songs.. they are widly availible im sure a file like this is just a compilation and therefore its okay

Posted by: David.C.Bond Dec 13 2007, 09:37 AM

As far as I'm aware noone owns copyright on GP files, as they are just one person's interpretation. But yeah lets see what the mods think!
The ball is in your court Andrew!

Posted by: tonymiro Dec 13 2007, 09:39 AM

As Uncreator has said please hold off posting any files until the mods have had a chance to discuss. Thanks guys.

Tony

Posted by: Iluha Dec 13 2007, 11:18 AM

by law, they are a violation of copyrights, because many artist release tab/note books of their songs, however in my opinion, unless you'r just copying the contents of the said above books to the programs, than claiming it's a violation of copyrights will be like claiming that a user made walkthrough for a game is a violation of copyrights of the official strategy guide.

Posted by: Goliath Dec 13 2007, 12:21 PM

I fail to see how a GP file would be any infringement on any one's intellectual property rights. Lets be serious, 9 times out of 10, they're wrong and you have to fix them yourself to get the song to play right (at least I do anyway, sometimes the positioning is a nightmare).

On one hand, spreading GP files is like distributing word files, the files themselves are nothing without the software.

Perhaps the closest comparison I can come up with is video game guides. The creators of games always release the guide, but you can usually find home made guides in text format after a week of the game being out. These files are not illegal, and I don't see why the GP files would be either.

edit: and after reading Iluha's post in its entirety I realize he's already championed this argument.

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Dec 13 2007, 01:37 PM

While I might personally agree with that, it really is more important what the courts regard as copyright infringement

There have been incidents in which websites have faced legal action over tabs, and none of us want that for GMC. We are still discussing this and I think we might be able to come up with a compromise of sorts, but lets see.

Posted by: Milenkovic Ivan Dec 13 2007, 02:09 PM

Well, they closed down my songbook site for copyrightet material. I think it cannot be done.

PS Nobody need to put a GMCs reputation on a line because those zip fles can easily be found on various places on the net.

Posted by: exorcyze Dec 13 2007, 04:07 PM

There's been a lot of discussion on this issue from a legal aspect. Several sites had shut down in anticipation of threats, even though there was no actual legal ruling on it. Basically "take your site down or we'll take you to court" intimidation. Most sites obviously can't afford that as they provide the tabs for free.

The argument from a legal standpoint is that you are robbing artists of money from selling their songbooks, and that you're distributing their copyrighted materials.

I'm not sure how you could make that actually stand, as that would mean that guitar mags probably shouldn't have anything on actually playing - since any transcription of music could potentially fall under that. In addition, does that mean that someone is subject to legal action for teaching someone how to play a song? Does it also mean that if I figure out how to play something by ear that I could be sued? Usually the GP tabs are someones interpertations - as evidenced by the fact that you can typically find about 30 versions of any given song - some even frequently from the same submitter as they refine what they originally transcribed.

And from a personal standpoint - I've very rarely purchased a songbook for a given artist. It's just not typically that important to me to learn someone elses material. Not having the tabs online is not going to make me spend more money on them - it just means I'll figure it out by ear or won't play it.

Of course as I'm sure we're all fully and painfully aware, logic such as this holds no place in our court system when weighed against the awesome power of the money and lawyers wielded by the recording industry. Regardless, for the time being, there is no official ruling on this to my knowledge - only cases of intimidation and threats.

Posted by: Goliath Dec 13 2007, 04:08 PM

I don't think GMC really needs it, the closest thing they could benefit from would be a board requesting help finding tabs "I can't find a GP file for this song, does anyone have an idea where to find it/have one?".

I really don't see how it would be any different than the bajillion lyrics sites out there.

But I am familiar with sites getting closed.

I mean maybe even stickying a post saying "Looking for guitar pro tabs? Check out this(these) sites"

then have links to ultimate-guitar.com and other sites that have lots of tabs.

Posted by: JCJXXL Dec 13 2007, 04:14 PM

How has

gotten away for years without getting in trouble?

EDIT: Nevermind...

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Dec 14 2007, 05:46 PM

And here is the final conclusion ...

GMC does not want to take the risk of directly hosting the tabs for the legal reasons mentioned above.

Rodnator, if you want to make the tabs available to GMC users, that is fine, but please do it in the following way:

• Please don't upload the Tabs directly
• Please do not place a direct link to the tabs on GMC
• The link you do place should take users to an independant webpage from where they can click to download the tabs

I hope this is ok

Posted by: blindwillie Dec 14 2007, 05:55 PM

That's probably the safest way to it Andrew.
Otherwise PM the person for details I guess.

Posted by: Rodnator Dec 14 2007, 07:10 PM

Hello all, I think that much sensible debate about this file I have has come to a logical conclusion. I am in the midst of building a home webserver for a variety of reasons, mostly to know how to do it, but it will still take some time to complete. It will be the future home of many files that I am willing to share. In the mean time, I do not know of a free webspace service that will allow a 116mb file. If anyone knows of such a service please let me know. But for now if your email service will allow a 116mb file please PM me with your email address and I will send it to you as an attachment. Also because I am in a very generous holiday mood. Anyone who can't get an email attachment of that size, PM me and provide me with a mailing address and I will send you a copy by snail mail. I can't leave this as a long term offer, but I think I can sqeeze out the postage for a couple dozen copies.
Peace and good will to all.
Rod

Posted by: Andrew Cockburn Dec 14 2007, 07:41 PM

You could also check out the YouSendIt service - its free and allows you to share large sized files.

Posted by: Rodnator Dec 14 2007, 10:15 PM

Thanks Andrew I have registered for YouSendIt service and It looks like all will work well. I have uploaded the file, and only need an email address to send an invite to download. Please PM me If anyone is interested. Thanks again
Cheers,
Rod